Free
by eatsleepreadwrite
Summary: Bellatrix Lestrange has found Frank and Alice Longbottom. This is the story of how Neville Longbottom lost the two people who loved him most. Headcannon. Rated T because it's not exactly happy...


He was after them, she knew it. He would send them, send them to hurt him. Her little son. They would torture her and her husband, that was almost guaranteed. Pain, torture, and quite possibly death. That wasn't what worried her, because she knew what she had signed up for, and she was fully aware of the risks at the time, and Frank knew them too. But her little boy? No. He never had a choice. He never got to choose his parents, his destiny, his enemies or even his own birthday. No-one said life was fair, but no-one said life was this unfair. She had sent him to Augusta's in the hope that he might be safe there. Safe being a relative term in this context, as in this world, was anyone truly safe? Safe from the horror that is Lord Voldemort? No, that was a silly dream. No-one would ever be safe from this crazy psychopathic man. She knew that he wouldn't come here personally to hurt her and her family, but rather he'd send some sadistic minion of his. She almost laughed as she realised that her fate would be determined by who Lord Voldemort decided to send. Her fate rested upon a choice of person. One person, and as Alice saw Bellatrix Lestrange enter the room, she knew that by the end, she'd be begging for the quick escape of death. After all, Bellatrix did like to play with her food.

"Hello Mrs Longbottom!" Bellatrix chirped cheerfully. "Ready to have some fun?" Alice closed her eyes and braced herself for the oncoming blast of spells that was sure to hit her. But none came. She heard a piercing scream and opened her eyes in confusion. She heard a cackled 'crucio!' and then the scream came again. When she looked through the small window at the end of the room, she saw her husband lying on the floor of the adjoining room, writhing in pain as Bellatrix Lestrange danced around like a lunatic, screaming 'crucio!' intermittently. Alice screamed and screamed for him, screamed for her to stop, screamed for Bellatrix to hurt her instead. However Bellatrix just smiled her evil, toothy smile, then continued to torture her husband as Alice looked on. Alice pounded on the window. She screamed and pounded on the glass, punched it, elbowed it, anything, anything at all to stop the pain her husband was experiencing. She couldn't stand to look, she wanted to look away, but not seeing it felt like a cowardly act. Like she shouldn't look away because being in the Order meant being someone better, and if Frank was suffering, she should suffer too. But every time he screamed, every time he pleaded for her to stop, to kill him, she could feel her heart crack just that little bit more, and those few more tears roll down her broken face. Hours later (or was it days?), Frank had stopped moving. He just lay there, a blank look on his face. He couldn't be dead, because she saw his chest rising and falling. He wasn't dead. Frank wouldn't die without her.

"Frank!" she screamed. He looked at her with an empty stare and failed to register the pain in his wife's face. He simply look back at the door, watching Bellatrix as she twirled out of the door. Alice leaped up, running for the door. She rattled the handle, and it came free. Bellatrix had opened the door witha sly grin on her face. Alice tore down the hallway and into the room with her husband lying motionless in it. She ripped the door open and ran to her husband, shaking his shoulders, begging him to wake up. She hugged him and slapped him, held him and cried for him, but he just lay there, motionless and lost. Alice sat down and sobbed, rocking back and forth, grieving the loss of her husband for really, he was just a shell now, empty of emotion and love, there was nothing left. Somewhere at the back of her mind, she registered that Bellatrix had entered the room, but she remained where she was, rocking back and forth. She heard the spell being cast, felt the excruciating pain shooting through her body, felt every nerve hurting. An image of Neville covered in blood passed across her vision and Alice screamed more. Now Frank appeared, covered in blood and strung up on a wall as Bellatrix poked and prodded in delight. Alice screamed more. It was too real, too painful, too truthful. It couldn't be true. God it hurt so much! Anything to stop this! The pain released its hold on her for a minute. She breathed a sigh of relief, but felt warm breath on her ear as Bellatrix leant down. "And once we're done with you, I think we'll pay a visit to your young Neville and see how he holds up under the cruciatus curse! What fun that will be!" She laughed, an awful laugh, and then the pain started again. Again and again the pain would come, racking her body till she begged to die. Tore at her own wrists to end her life, tried to claw her eyes out, because even that hurt less than the cruciatus curse. After a few hours of on and off cursing, Alice felt herself slip into numbness, a cool black darkness of nothing, welcoming her with open arms. She succumbed willingly, and then she no longer felt the pain. No longer felt the pain of the spell, of the truth, of life. She was free.


End file.
